OFFSTAGE: Trace Adkins: Lover or Fighter?

(CMT Offstage keeps a 24/7 watch on everything that’s happening with country music artists behind the scenes and out of the spotlight.)

Oh, the dichotomy of Trace Adkins
. One minute he’s revealing the details of his upcoming album of all love songs (Love Will …), and the next he’s going head-to-head with his old nemesis Piers Morgan on All-Star Celebrity Apprentice. On Sunday’s (March 3) premiere,
Adkins recalled that he’d never actually been “fired” in that signature Donald Trump way when he was on Celebrity Apprentice. But the way Morgan (that season’s winner) remembered it was that he had been the one to fire Adkins. “Did you? I don’t think so. I would’ve slapped the [expletive] outta you,” Adkins said in his deadpan way. “Calm down, cowboy. It’s not my fault I beat you,” Morgan said. It was awkward, tense, uncomfortable and fantastic — the stuff reality shows are made of. I am glad there are two sides to Adkins, though, so he can walk out of that uptight Manhattan boardroom and into a happier place where there’s country love in his heart.